iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 31/08/2026

And for those who complain about anthropomorphising:

Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 17/06/2026

1/ The biggest problem in today's world? It's not climate change, pandemics, or democratic collapse. It's that too many brilliant minds are stuck in boring corporate jobs, instead of working on those problems.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 04/06/2026

I've finally caved, I'm starting a Substack. Field notes from inside my new career!

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 28/05/2026

Billionaires pay about half as much in taxes as everyone else. Why? Better lobbyists. But history shows we can win this fight. Same arguments were made against income tax, democracy still prevailed. It can again. Excited to team up with @gabrielzucman.bsky.social to make sure it does.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 30/04/2026

Last year, 52% of Harvard graduates went into finance, consulting or (big) tech. I was invited by students to talk about this waste of talent, and what we can do about it. Link in next tweet →

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 21/04/2026

INSANELY powerful speech about one of the most evil, legal industries: Big Tobacco. This industry kills 8+ million people/year. More than HIV/AIDS, TB, and malaria combined. The #1 cause of preventable death on earth. Yet the fight against it gets just 0.1% of global health funding. 🧵

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 15/04/2026

2/ Here's what happened. The Daily Mail got the story, claimed my entire first lecture was an anti-Trump rant — a lie — and splashed it on the front page. The White House director of communications instantly labeled me a "rabid anti-Trump individual."

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 15/04/2026

1/ Less than 24 hours before broadcast, the BBC called me and said: we're editing a line out of your lecture. The line? That Donald Trump is the most openly corrupt president in American history.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 13/04/2026

Over 80% of people want a wealth tax for billionaires. Of course they’re resisting with their army of lawyers and lobbyists, but we’re building ours. I’m so excited to be teaming up with @gabrielzucman.bsky.social 👉

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 10/04/2026

Sam Altman is the most dangerous man in Silicon Valley right now. The board that fired him? Replaced. The safety team that questioned his priorities? Dissolved. The nonprofit structure that was supposed to keep mission above profit? Restructured. The employees who wanted to speak out? Silenced.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 08/04/2026

GiveDirectly has sent $1 billion in cash directly to people in extreme poverty. Their model has no middle man and study after study shows it works. Any billionaire could call them tomorrow and help pull an entire country out of poverty. For some, it would cost about a year in the stock market.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 27/03/2026

We pay you to quit your job and spend 7 months fighting the tobacco industry, transforming the food system, or making the superrich pay their fair share in taxes. 37 fellowships. US, Canada, Europe, Kenya. Applications close April 27th.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 26/03/2026

80% of billionaire political spending goes to one party. Guess which one.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 25/03/2026

As a historian, I've always been careful with the word "fascism." We've all seen how it shuts down debate when everyone throws it at everything they don't like. But at some point, being careful with the word starts to mean being blind to the thing itself.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 18/03/2026

Peter Thiel literally wrote that freedom and democracy are not 'compatible' and that regulating Big Tech is the work of the 'anti-Christ'. Stop treating this as metaphor. When billionaires tell you they want to end democracy, take them seriously.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 04/03/2026

The international boycott of ChatGPT has absolutely exploded. 2.5M people have already joined, and this is just the beginning. Go to quitgpt.org. Cancel your subscription, delete your account. And tell at least one person why. My op-ed: www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 25/02/2026

This is the most important thing happening in the world right now. Trump and Hegseth want killer drones + mass surveillance of Americans. Anthropic refuses to build it. While most tech companies fall in line, they are prepared to pay the price for their principles.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 25/02/2026

What conservatives did to Bud Light in 2023, that's what progressives should do to ChatGPT in 2026. OpenAI is so vulnerable right now. With enough pressure, I think it's actually possible to take the whole company down. quitgpt.org

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 20/02/2026

The BBC just remade Lord of the Flies — the story that taught generations humans are fundamentally savage. But when it ACTUALLY happened in real life? Six boys shipwrecked for over a year built a functioning society.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 17/02/2026

Luckily 'the politicians left of center are in better shape on “take AI seriously, please” than the intellectuals.'

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 16/02/2026

I tell Ryan Holiday something unexpected: ego can push people to do the right thing. History's biggest moral revolutions didn't just happen from obligation, they happened because people cared about their legacy. Vanity isn't pure, but it's powerful.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 09/02/2026

The best conspiracies are the ones that change the world. In 1884, the Fabian Society plotted to bring us the 8-hour workday and votes for women. In 1947, a handful of intellectuals met in Switzerland to roll back the state. They called themselves 'neoliberals.'

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 06/02/2026

Just before Trump's re-election, I attended a tech conference in Silicon Valley. Over dinner, a tech bro spoke in ways that reminded me of 1930s fascists. I pointed this out. He replied, without irony: "Yeah, I think we should get a little fascy."

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 04/02/2026

One of the most effective things you can do right now to fight Trump and ICE is to cancel your ChatGPT subscription.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 03/02/2026

Europe loves to lecture the world about values, but morals without power is just vibes. We regulate AI we don’t build, sell handbags instead of hardware, and rely on others for our security and energy. If we really believe in liberal democracy, we’d better be willing to back it up.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 02/02/2026

Finally. A voice for the voiceless.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 29/01/2026

ICE's $100M ad campaign is using the same playbook as the Gestapo & Stasi. The goal? To make repression sound reasonable and patriotic.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 27/01/2026

We’re hiring a marketing specialist at the School for Moral Ambition (NYC). If you’re a marketer who wants to work on something meaningful with a small team, this might be for you.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 26/01/2026

We think of wars as the pinnacle of human violence. The numbers tell a different story. Every year, humans slaughter around 80 billion animals. That's more suffering than all wars combined.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 23/01/2026

Rome didn’t fall overnight. It rotted in public first. Tell me this all doesn’t sound too familiar…

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 21/01/2026

Sometimes you get a few minutes on live TV with a billionaire. I tried to make them count! 😅

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 19/01/2026

It's that magical time of year when private jets descend on a Swiss mountain village to discuss climate change and poverty! Anyway, here's my annual reminder. I'll stop posting this when they stop avoiding the real issue: their own massive tax avoidance 💰

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 16/01/2026

For most of history, progress was a flat line. Then everything took off like a rocket. The only question now: does this story end in liftoff... or collapse? A short excerpt from the incredible video The Market Exit made - one of my favorite interviews. Check it out: www.youtube.com/@TheMarketExit

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 14/01/2026

In 1935, a publisher named Allen Lane walked into a train station and asked a radical question: “Why shouldn’t a great book cost as little as a pack of cigarettes?” That question led to the paperback revolution. Books in kiosks, corner shops, train stations. Books not for elites, but for everyone.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 12/01/2026

8% of workers perceive their job as socially useless, while another 17% are doubtful about the usefulness of their job. Source: Dur and Van Lent (2019). (And no, these are not all government bureaucrats. In fact, there are three times as many BS-jobs in the private sector as in the public sector.)

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 09/01/2026

Many are laughing at how clownish this administration feels, but historians of fascism aren’t laughing, some are packing their bags. Crackdowns on universities. Pressure on judges. Tactics straight out of Hungary and Poland, now showing up here.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 02/01/2026

Every major movement in history was built by people who didn’t fully agree with each other. If someone’s with you 70–80% of the way, they’re not your enemy, they’re your ally.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 30/12/2025

Forget “Follow your passion.” At the School for Moral Ambition, we say: Follow the Gandalf 🧙 Gandalf didn’t ask Frodo about his passions. He said: “Here’s a world-sized problem. You’re the one to fix it.” So… which big, solvable, overlooked problem could you be the unlikely hero for?

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 24/12/2025

Factory farming isn't just about animals. It’s also about farmers trapped in crushing debt and contracts they can’t escape. We’re currently building a fellowship to take this system on and only need to raise $8,100 more to reach our fundraising goal! Donate + learn more: moralambition.org/food

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 23/12/2025

Imagine if serving in government was as prestigious as landing a job at Google. In Finland and Singapore, it basically is. Public service is seen as a privilege, a place where the most ambitious people go to solve the biggest problems. That’s the culture we should be striving for.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 19/12/2025

This video will probably get fewer likes than my posts on taxing billionaires. That difference says it all. Factory farming only survives if we don’t look. It’s time to hold these companies accountable. Every donation is matched, so $1 becomes $2 through Dec 31, 2025. Donate: MoralAmbition.org/food

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 02/12/2025

What if you could instantly DOUBLE your impact? This Giving Tuesday, every dollar to The School for Moral Ambition’s U.S. Food System Reform Program is matched. We’re raising $100K to launch a fellowship to help end factory farming. Your $1 = $2. moralambition.org/food

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 02/12/2025

Goodbye planet-wrecking Black Friday, hello world-healing Giving Tuesday! We're raising funds to end factory farming: one of the most polluting industries on earth, responsible for the suffering of billions of animals. Support us now, every donation is doubled! moralambition.org/food

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 27/11/2025

Wow. BBC journalists are now not even allowed to report the censored line from my Reith Lecture, that Trump is “the most openly corrupt president in American history.” You can hear how carefully they’re forced to tiptoe around it. So chilling...

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 25/11/2025

What it looks like in the transcript versus what I actually said.

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 16/11/2025

Happy with this blurb: "A rabid anti-Trump individual" 😎

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Rutger Bregman @rutgerbregman.com · 16/11/2025

Great to see that the White House and the Daily Mail are as excited by the upcoming publication of my BBC Reith Lectures as I am!

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